City is a place, which is created by its inhabitants. It is through participation in planning and involvement in various grass-root initiatives and activism, that citizens obtain their rights for the city. The vocabulary and practices of a city dweller start including such notions as Do-it-yourself culture, partizaning, urban gardening, public-art and other types of interventions. Overcoming estrangement from the living environment has been an important trend in Europe lately. It also becomes increasingly popular in Russia. The process of joint creation of the city environment, sometimes in quite unexpected formats, attracts representatives of different social and professional groups by giving them possibility to realize their creative potential. In what way can interactive and creative practices put an impact on urban environment? To what extent are this kind of initiatives sustainable? What are the strategies and tactics for activists’ interaction with authorities? What kind of impact do these initiatives put on the creative sector and creative industries?

On 19-20 October, 2012 the workshop «Art and activism in urban environment: impact on creative sector» will take place in Kaliningrad.

The workshop is organized by the Information office of the Nordic Council of Ministers in Kaliningrad and the Agency for Support of Cultural Initiatives «Tranzit» (www.tranzit-kaliningrad.ru ) in cooperation with The Centre for Independent Sociological Research, St.-Petersburg (www.cisr.ru ) in the framework of the Creative industries Development project finance by the NCM.

Theorists and practitioners of grass-root urban initiatives from the Nordic countries and North-West Russia will take part in the workshop as experts. Oleg Pachenkov and Lilia Voronkova from the St.-Petersburg Centre for Independent Social Research will present sociological perspective on DiY culture based on examples of «Do it yourself» marathon and partizaning in St.-Petersburg.

During the workshop two public/street art projects linked to Copenhagen will be presented. One of them was initiated by a private gallery, the other one by the Copenhagen subway. Rune Drewsen will present «Urban treasure hunt». It is an interactive urban game inviting Copenhagen inhabitants and visitors to explore the city anew and to appropriate it. The project shows how street-art allows to reveal the city’s potential, to explore hidden «treasures», which already exist in the urban space and to personalize inhabitants’ relations with the city. Mimi Larsson will speak about cooperation with a public company, how the fences of a metro construction site can be transformed into a gallery and how art helps reducing tensions and temporary inconveniences, how it influences social interactions between city dwellers.

Giving an example of the «Parascope» project and other experiments, Erik Sandelin from the studio for interactive design and innovations «Unsworn Industries» (Malmo) will present his ideas on how local authorities and inhabitants can jointly create new images of a city, how new forms of visualization and prototypes can help developing a productive dialogue about city’s potential future.

The practical part of the workshop will focus on exploring potential for grass-root creative and activist initiatives in Kaliningrad. On the 20th of October during a field trip on an old tram experts and participants of the workshop will discuss ideas for possible interactive practices aiming to involve creative sector into urban planning, rethinking and appropriation of urban environment.

Preliminary Program

16:00 – 16:40 Right for the city: origins of DiY in urban environment and development of the creative sector. Oleg Pachenkov, director at The Centre for Independent Sociological Research, St.-Petersburg.

16:40 – 17:20 Experience, problems and potential of DiY projects based on the example of «Do-it-yourself» marathon in St.-Petersburg. Lilia Voronkova, researcher at The Centre for Independent Sociological Research, St.-Petersburg.

12:20 – 13:00 Creating a city together: prototypes and visualization of the future city as a form for interaction between authorities and citizens. Erik Sandelin, studio for interactive design and innovations Unsworn Industries, Malmo, Sweden.